Articles
Ready to get your read on? Dive into the article archive to help you build wealth through real estate investing. We feature top subject matter experts exploring every facet of the industry.
Articles
Ready to get your read on? Dive into the article archive to help you build wealth through real estate investing. We feature top subject matter experts exploring every facet of the industry.
Amit Aggarwal: Refining A Real Estate Platform
Amit Aggarwal joined Auction.com as its chief technology officer in late 2017, but the experienced senior information technology (IT) leader had his eye on the needs of the national housing market for more than a decade before the hire. As early as 2005, Aggarwal was watching the residential real estate industry, ...
New Research Predicts Rent Hikes for Amazon HQ2 Location
Amazon has made the process around selecting a location for its second national headquarters into an extremely high-profile, yet secretive, process. New research from Zillow makes the stakes higher for investors trying to guess which metro area will be the lucky winner of HQ2. Zillow researchers announced that some cities ...
Emerging SoCal Real Estate Factor Affecting Long and Short-Term Rentals
The Southern California market, like the entire California real estate market, is hot for investments at the moment. Both the traditional and the Airbnb rental strategies can be very lucrative because of the factors driving the local economy. People are both moving to Southern California for the long run and ...
Driverless Car Fad Frees Up Garage Space
As driverless cars become more popular and the technology more advanced, real estate design and values are likely to adapt. According to Justin Thompson, a columnist at Forbes.com, driverless cars could usher in an era where people voluntarily “forego car ownership and/or leasing in favor of [a ride-sharing] system.” If ...
Federal Flood Insurance Program to Expire July 31
The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), a federal program offering flood coverage to more than 5 million property owners nationwide, will lapse at midnight on July 31, 2018, if it is not extended. The program, which has been extended six times since September 2017, is among the only options available ...
Supreme Court Ruling Makes Way for Fair Housing Suits Against Lenders
A 2017 ruling from the Supreme Court says cities have the right to sue banks and lenders if they can prove violations of the Fair Housing Act caused the plaintiff city direct harm. The ruling, a result of a lawsuit brought against Bank of America, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo by ...
Mashvisor Names Top 5 Markets for Airbnb Investments for June
Airbnb rentals tend to flourish when tourist destinations heat up in the summer months, so it likely will come as little surprise that Mashvisor’s top five markets are all in attractive destination locations. According to the real estate analysts at the rental data company, California cities dominated the short-term rental ...
5 Hardest-Hit Markets for Housing Inventory Shortages
In several major markets, a shortage of existing housing inventory is approaching crisis levels. For real estate investors, that could represent a great opportunity if they have access to off-market leads for properties. According to CoreLogic, metro areas with strong job growth trends are particularly short on available homes for ...
Chicago Condos Attract Owners with Car-Sharing Perks
Amenities and perks could be the difference between a condo investment that fills up quickly with paying residents and one that doesn't. Vista Tower, which will open next year, is erring on the side of perks. They are offering residents access to onsite Tesla vehicles as an amenity that comes ...
City of Columbus Files Complaint Against Real Estate Investors for Alleged Blight
The city of Columbus, Ohio, has filed a complaint against a Nebraska-based corporation that owns 11 properties in the area. Alleging the corporation is a shield to protect the real estate investors who own the properties from liability, the Columbus city attorney filed a case against three corporations and two ...
Leading National Real Estate Investing Event Coming to SoCal
Think Realty will hold a Conference and Expo, July 14 and 15, at the Marriott Irvine Spectrum. The real estate investing event will focus on technology and innovation, while also featuring real estate industry pros, educational breakout sessions on topics relevant to investors, panel discussions, valuable networking opportunities and the latest ...
Real Estate Professionals Increasingly Reliant on Mobile Devices
According to a new survey from Realtors Property Resource (RPR), and the National Association of Realtors (NAR), about a third of real estate professionals spend about seven hours of their workday on their mobile phones. They’re not necessarily just checking Facebook, either. Respondents said they are using that time for ...
Government Regulations Account for Nearly One-Third of Multifamily Development Costs
Government regulations make up about a third (32.1%) of the cost of multifamily development, reported the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and the National Multifamily Housing Council (NMHC) this week. In the joint report, nine in 10 multifamily developers said they incur costs from: Delays due to “long approval ...
REI Club Members Take on the “Total Gut Job” Tudor with Detailed Plans
I’d like to say that after the Affinity REI Club closed on its first investment property in February, we dove right into renovations while sporting plaid shirts, overalls and big, cheesy grins, then promptly unveiled the gorgeous Tudor to sparkly-eyed buyers after 21 minutes of action and nine minutes of ...
Don’t Let Travel Deter Your Long-Distance Investments
There are real estate opportunities in nearly every corner of the world today. Luckily, you’re no longer confined to your local area as you might have been 15 or 20 years ago. Online resources and real-time technologies now connect buyers, sellers, landlords, and tenants from hundreds or even thousands of ...
Fed Raises Interest Rates for the Second Time This Year
Citing information indicating “the labor market has continued to strengthen and that economic activity has been rising at a solid rate,” the Federal Open Market Committee of the Federal Reserve opted to increase the federal funds rate by 25 basis points to 2% this week. Most analysts expected the Fed ...
Renovation Rockstar: California Dreamin’
Featured investor: Rick Melero, principal at HIS Capital Group Located less than 20 minutes from Disneyland and less than 30 minutes from beautiful SoCal beaches, North Tustin is a desirable Orange County enclave offering the California lifestyle dreams are made of. For Rick Melero, principal of HIS Capital Group, this residential ...
U.S. Homeowner Equity Passes $1 Trillion Mark
Just under two-thirds of homeowners saw double-digit increases in their home equity between March 2017 and March 2018 according to CoreLogic. That increase equated to a total gain of $1.01 trillion, which contributed to a decline in negative equity over the same period. The total number of mortgaged residential properties ...
Real Estate Agent Sets World Record: $1.9 Billion Sold
Let the “everything’s bigger in Texas” jokes begin. Ben Caballero will laugh all the way to the bank. Caballero, who already held the world record for selling $1.444 billion worth of homes in 2016, topped that record in 2017 with $1.906 billion in home sales. Caballero sold 3,556 homes in ...
Case Study: A Unique Master-Planned Subdivision Investment
The U.S. population is growing, households are forming, and yet, there is a shortage of residential housing. This supply/demand imbalance is driving property values up, creating a unique opportunity for developers. However, builders are still gun-shy after the housing meltdown of 2008. As such, many are avoiding the development of ...
Behind the Scenes: Commercial Real Estate Conversion
PROJECT BREAKDOWN Purchased: July 2015 Opening Date: January 2017 Investment: Just under $2 million Payoff: + Corporate campus bringing 65 full-time jobs from ZIP code 38117 to 38122 + Host location for small businesses, church plants, and job trainings + Local area beautification Difficulties encountered: - Upgrading all major systems ...
Regional Real Estate Spotlight: Southern California
Southern California, often referred to as SoCal, is defined in many ways. You can use the term to refer to California’s 10 southernmost counties. You could use it to refer to the geographic area surrounding three of the country’s largest metropolitan areas and those areas themselves. You could use it ...
“Cluster Mailboxes” Affect Developments, Demand
To reduce or even eliminate sidewalk and curbside delivery, the U.S. Post Office has begun encouraging a new form of mass mail delivery. Nearly two-thirds of single-family builders report they have had a local post office request “cluster mailbox” installations for new developments. Cluster mailboxes serve a group of homes ...
Top 3 Reasons Closings Were Delayed in April 2018
About one in every five closings were delayed or terminated in April 2018, according to findings from the Realtors Confidence Index, released by the National Association of Realtors (NAR) this week. 17 percent of April’s closings were delayed. 5 percent were terminated. The survey is based on responses from more ...
The Best Counties for Buying Single Family Rentals
ATTOM Data Solutions analyzed 449 U.S. counties for potential single family rental returns in 2018 to help real estate investors identify the best places for buying single family rentals this year. Rental data was from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and home price data was from publicly ...
